Many students waited until the last minute to submit their paperwork, but in the end a total of 170 of them applied for the new $2,000 Bay Commitment Scholarship.

A three-member committee at the Bay Area Community Foundation, which is funding the scholarship, now has the task of deciding which 100 students will receive the money.

All 170 applicants must also be verified to make sure they all are Bay City Public Schools students and have been in the district for at least six full years.

The deadline for the scholarship - which must be applied toward a degree at Delta College or Saginaw Valley State University - was Saturday. As of Feb. 28, only 45 applications had come in.

Suzanne Murphy, director of college preparation services for the district, said it was a great relief this week when she learned how many applications had come in under the wire.

"I was thrilled," she said. "You just never know."

Folks at the Foundation office kept telling Murphy to relax, she said, that a flurry of applications always comes in at the last minute.

The scholarship, a two-year pilot program, is targeted to students who will be the first in their family to go to college. One of the qualifications for the scholarship is that neither of the student's parents or legal guardians can hold a four-year college degree.

That information would be difficult to verify, Murphy said, but students and their parents had to sign a statement saying that the information was true, and that falsification would result in loss of the scholarship money.

The school district will not have a say in narrowing down the list of applications to 100.

"This is a different scholarship from many of the other ones," Murphy said, adding that grade point averages are not being considered in the application process and that students were required to write an essay as part of the application and submit letters of reference.

"This is a first-generation student who hasn't had a lot of students before him that could give him helpful hints."

Many of the essays focused on how the students want a better life, and most know they will need additional schooling to get there, Murphy said. "These essays, I believe, you will feel the heart. They're honest."

Jerome Yantz, acting director of the Bay Area Community Foundation, said that about $1 million of a $4 million needed to endow the scholarship has been raised.

Scholarship winners will be notified in mid-April, and an awards ceremony will be held at 7 p.m. May 14 at the Consistory Chapel, 614 Center Ave.